How Should the U.S. Respond to the Gaza Crisis?

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Israel's latest military assault is a disproportionate and inhumane response to Palestinian militants' cross-border rocket attacks against Israel, which recalls its devastating and widely condemned military assault on Lebanon just two years ago. The U.S. must act swiftly and decisively to prevent an Israeli massacre of Palestinians, since Israeli officials have said the military strikes could continue for days or months, and could include ground forces.

While the U.N., the European Union, Russia and Egypt have harshly condemned Israel's use of force while also calling on Hamas to end the rocket fire, the Bush administration today blamed Hamas for the end to the cease-fire and demanded that it stop firing rockets and limited itself to calling on Israel only to avoid hitting civilians. MPAC  also calls on the Obama transition team to be ready to fairly and constructively address the conflict in the Middle East when they take office.

Earlier this month, MPAC called on the administration to follow the footsteps of the U.N., which called for Israel to lift its stifling blockade on the Gaza Strip. The economy has been paralyzed; food, water and electricity are in short supply; and observers have described conditions there as "the worst ever." The policy of collective punishment has now escalated beyond the blockade to crushing military force that may be aimed at Hamas, but is also costing the lives of civilians who are struggling just to survive in the brutal economic situation.

In "Envisioning Peace: The MPAC Perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,"  MPAC calls for a two-state solution where each state is truly and fully sovereign on an equal basis.  

Since the inception of Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories on the heels of the Six Day War in June 1967, scores of U.N. resolutions and calls by the international community for an end to the most crucial aspects of the occupation -- notably the relentless expansion of Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories -- remain unheeded.

And it is that occupation, now as then, that stands at the heart of the conflict between two peoples engaged in a vicious and utterly unequal struggle over territory. It has taken a terrible toll on all those involved in the conflict. Today, there is a generation of Palestinians who have known nothing but occupation and a generation of Israelis who have experienced only dominance over the Palestinians.